A Little Honesty in Self-Grading

Honesty in grading

Abby Rapoport at the Texas Tribune has an excellent report posted today about the Texas Department of Transportation’s five-person Transportation Commission who gave themselves a grade of C, on their best day.

State lawmakers have their own special vocabulary for describing the Texas Department of Transportation: Intractable. Defensive. Secretive. Broken.

Bill Meadows knows what they’re getting at. “I don’t think we are fully succeeding,” says Meadows, a non-combative voice on the five-member Transportation Commission. “On our very best day we probably are getting a ‘C’.” If you listen to state legislators, even that constitutes grade inflation.

It’s a good piece, and if you’re interested in Texas transportation policy and issues, I’d recommend you go read the entire piece.

However, as soon as I read the first paragraph, my mind immediately replaced “Traffic Commission” with “President Obama,” who recently graded himself a B+ after his first year as President.

As in, President Obama’s first year was defined by being: Intractable. Defensive. Secretive. Broken.

Whereas our Traffic Commission gave themselves an admittedly inflated C, our President, who has had a much worse year than our Traffic Commission gave himself a B+.